The present invention relates to audio data recording/reproducing apparatus and methods which store audio data in an external storage device, such as a hard disk device, and edit and reproduce the thus-stored audio data.
In digital audio recorders including digital mixing recorders, which use an external storage device such as a hard disk device, a file of song management data is created for each song (which is one complete unit of music to be recorded or reproduced and corresponds, for example, to a single piece of music), so as to manage sound data (waveform data) stored in the external storage device. The song management data for each song include various information necessary for reproducing the song, which includes data indicative of recorded locations (clusters), on the external storage device, of a series of the song-constituting sound data.
In such digital audio recorders, the external storage device includes a song-management-data storing address area, and a sound-data storing address area. In the song-management-data storing address area, there are stored song management data for individual songs. In the sound data storing address area, sound data of individual takes—each take corresponds to recording on one occasion—are stored on a cluster-by-cluster basis. Same sound data may be used more than once in one song or may be shared among a plurality of songs.
When reproduction of a given song is instructed, access is made to particular addresses in the song-management-data storing address area where are stored the song management data of the given song, so as to read out the song management data. Then, on the basis of the read-out song management data, access is made sequentially to particular clusters where are stored the sound data of the given song, to thereby reproduce the given song.
Each song is made up of a plurality of tracks, and each of the tracks is made up of a plurality of regions. Each of the regions is in turn composed of a linkage of a plurality of nodes corresponding to clusters. Editing can be performed on each of these hierarchical levels, song, track and region. Through punch-in (and punch-out) operations, new sound data can be recorded additively into a desired section of a music piece, and a section of the same music piece can be copied and pasted to a desired section of the music piece.
During editing, it has been conventional to preserve history records of individual editing operations performed in such a manner that the editing can be undone later. Thus, management for keeping the records of the editing operations tends to be very complicated and laborious, and the management would impose heavy burdens on software used.
Further, the punch-in, short-time recording, editing of the regions, etc. would produce a sound-data-deficient cluster among a succession of clusters which is reproducible only for a limited portion thereof. Because such a sound-data-deficient cluster is reproduced in a very short time, preparations for reproducing the next cluster can not be appropriately made in time during reproduction of the successive clusters, which would prevent stable sound data reproduction.